General Discussion AGY, page-23660

G'day Jezzaaa, good post. From my perspective, there are a few additional factors worth considering. In particular, I think shareholders here have learned the hard way that information in company releases shouldn't be taken at face value, and that’s where I see things a bit differently from you.

For example, from your comments about "what's occurring":

1) "Using the learnings from the 2,000 plant (including issues encountered) to finish the 10,000 plant engineering plans (in collaboration with a third-party engineering firm)."

They’ve mentioned this is happening, and I do believe it is, but at what pace, and how long will it take? It seems people forget that the engineering and design for the 10 ktpa expansion started back in Q2 2023, which is over 15 months ago. Back then, specifically on 27 June 2023, in the Macquarie Critical Minerals Forum Presentation, they stated that construction would begin in the second half of 2023. So, at the absolute latest, AGY anticipated that pre-development work for the 10 ktpa expansion would take 6-9 months. Now, they’ve been "finishing" these engineering plans for almost double that time. They are still working on them, but probably at a snail's pace, likely because once they wrap up, they’ll have nothing substantial to report to shareholders. If funding for the expansion was available, these plans would have been completed long ago (IMO).

"2) once the engineering plans are done, the FID (Financial Investment Decision) paperwork can be done. Which basically includes all the information a "strategic partner" would want to know when injecting money to fund the 10,000 TPA plant. (I have now learnt to ignore any carrots on a stick in relation to strategic partnerships until that FID is complete (ffs)"

AGY can’t proceed with a FID without the necessary funds or a clear financial strategy to secure them. The "paperwork" you mention is likely a feasibility study, or at the very least an updated PEA/scoping study, which would provide most of the data a potential strategic partner would need, but JZ's "fast-track strategy" skipped this step for years. He finally conceded one was needed, and an updated feasibility was supposed to be finished in H2 2023, almost a year ago, as stated in the 2023 Half Yearly Report. Yet it's still not done, almost a year later.

"3) Upgrading the JORC Mineral Resource Estimate, based on new strategic tenement acquisitions at the Project (an Indicated MRE of 606,313 tonnes Li2CO3 with a weighted mean average lithium concentration of 326mg/L, and)"

The last JORC upgrade had some drill holes outside their existing tenements. They’re not doing any expansion drilling, and they don’t have the funds for it anyway. They’re simply reworking the previous report and modelling to include already-drilled areas. I doubt this will lead to anything more than a modest resource increase, and I’m sceptical it will change the overall perception of the company. Many noticed that AGY only started discussing expanding the resource after acquiring the new tenements in late June, about a month before C&M was announced. The timing and intent are suspicious, and it feels like a low-cost move to appear busy.

4) As revealed by the half-yearly accounts, intentions have been articulated to start this year the paperwork for the 24,000 TPA environmental permits (signs to me, that despite all the knowledge they know of what's going on behind the scenes their long-term view is intact).

As with the other points, this seems like another low-cost attempt to look active. Right now, there’s no realistic path to 10 ktpa, let alone 24 ktpa. I don’t think the environmental submission efforts are anything more than window-dressing. It’s cheap and will be years before anyone sees it for what it is. That said, it’s not a bad thing to do, but reading into this as some kind of surety about AGY’s future plans seems overly optimistic.

Ultimately, I think some are being misled again by the bloke who has heavily overused the word "imminent." The key issues that matter—and are within AGY’s control—are securing funding, landing offtakes, and sorting out production. None of that is being addressed, so the focus has shifted to largely pointless busywork. Sure, they’re not completely idle, but they’re not making real progress either. Instead, they’re leaning on desktop expansions, desktop environmental approvals, and desktop engineering plans that should’ve been done nearly a year ago.

I’ll be impressed when they stop with the paperwork and start delivering something tangible, like fixing the 2 ktpa plant.

All just my opinion, of course.